The speech Against Eubulides (Demosth. 57) is a crucial source for understanding how civic identity was defined and contested in Athens during the second half of the 4th century BCE. The speech revolves around the case of Euxitheos, a citizen of the deme of Halimous, who was removed from the civic register during the diapsephisis of 346/5 BCE—a systematic review of the demes’ registries. Eubulides presided over this exclusion process and led the deme’s vote, later becoming the main prosecutor in the legal proceedings that would determine whether Euxitheos could be reinstated. Since the deme’s decision lacked legal authority without the consent of those excluded (apopsephismenoi), the case was brought before the court. Eubulides was one of five delegates appointed by the deme to argue the case.
The speech provides a detailed look at the evidentiary strategies used to prove citizenship and highlights the difficulties in verifying maternal status in a system where civic legitimacy had to be publicly confirmed.
According to Pericles’ law of 451/0 BCE, Athenian citizenship was limited to those born to both an Athenian father and an Athenian mother. Euxitheos was therefore compelled to demonstrate not only his father’s citizenship but also his mother’s. The prosecution had attempted to undermine the Athenian origins of both parents—questioning the father’s status by alleging he spoke with a “foreign” accent (Demosth. 57.18–20), and casting doubt on the mother’s legitimacy by referencing her humble occupation (Demosth. 57.34–36).
In Athens, proving maternal citizenship was often more challenging than paternal, since women were not registered in the demes. Instead, evidence relied on their presentation by a kyrios—usually a father or husband—at the phratria. Sources mention presentations of daughters (Is. 3.73, 76) and brides (Is. 3.76, 79; 8.18, 20; Demosth. 57.43, 69). In court, these events required corroborating testimony from involved family members, similar to procedures used for men. However, women’s limited visibility in public life meant the only available proof of their status often came from relatives or acquaintances able to confirm key moments in their lives: birth to Athenian parents, the engye (or engyesis, the promise of marriage made by the kyrios), and the gamelia, the wedding banquet marking the bride’s formal introduction to the husband’s phratria (cf. Demosth. 57.43; Is. 3.30).
Because of their restricted public presence, these key moments in women’s lives were difficult to verify, increasing their vulnerability in legal challenges to civic legitimacy—which could also affect the citizenship status of their children. The difficulty was not just practical, but structural: while male identity was anchored in public institutions and records, female identity relied almost entirely on sworn testimony.
In this context, Against Eubulides confirms the evidentiary value of the engyesis and the testimonies associated with it in citizenship cases. In Demosth. 57.41 (a), Euxitheos describes his parents’ engye: his mother was promised in marriage by her brother Timocrates to Euxitheos’ father, Thucritus, in the presence of two uncles and other witnesses. The stress on procedural regularity and the fact that some witnesses were still alive emphasizes the importance of shared memory and public recognition in validating citizenship.
To support his civic status, Euxitheos also refers, in Demosth. 57.54 (b), to his ritual integration into his father’s phratria and participation in the cult of Apollo Patrios. Since he was a child at the time, he argues he could not have influenced or bribed the phratores. His father, still alive then, introduced him in a formal ceremony and swore under oath that his son had been born to an Athenian woman lawfully promised in marriage (engyetes). Again, civic identity is established through public ritual and sworn testimony—key tools for constructing legal truth.
Taken together, these two passages from Against Eubulides offer a valuable window into how female citizenship in 4th-century BCE Athens depended heavily on the ability to verify two crucial events: marriage and birth. Women’s civic legitimacy relied largely on the availability of witnesses who could confirm that these social rituals had been properly observed—events that, for women, formed the foundation of community membership.
a. Demosth. 57.41 ὁ Πρωτόμαχος πένης ἦν· ἐπικλήρου δὲ κληρονομήσας εὐπόρου, τὴν μητέρα βουληθεὶς ἐκδοῦναι πείθει λαβεῖν αὐτὴν Θούκριτον τὸν πατέρα τὸν ἐμόν, ὄνθ᾽ ἑαυτοῦ γνώριμον, καὶ ἐγγυᾶται ὁ πατὴρ τὴν μητέρα τὴν ἐμὴν παρὰ τοῦ ἀδελφοῦ αὐτῆς Τιμοκράτους Μελιτέως, παρόντων τῶν τε θείων ἀμφοτέρων τῶν ἑαυτοῦ καὶ ἄλλων μαρτύρων· καὶ τούτων ὅσοι ζῶσι, μαρτυρήσουσιν ὑμῖν.
Protomachus was a poor man. Because he stood to win the inheritance of a rich epikleros, Protomachus wanted to marry my mother off, and he persuaded my father Thucrites, an acquaintance of his, to take her. My father married her in a ceremony in which her brother, Timocrates of the deme Melite, gave her away, and both his uncles and other men witnessed the ceremony. Those men in that group still alive will give you their testimony (transl. Bers 2003, 120).
b. Demosth. 57.54 καὶ ταῦτ᾽ οὐχὶ νῦν πεπεισμένοι ποιοῦσιν, ἀλλὰ παιδίον ὄντα μ᾽ εὐθέως ἦγον εἰς τοὺς φράτερας, εἰς Ἀπόλλωνος πατρῴου ἦγον, εἰς τἄλλ᾽ ἱερά. καίτοι οὐ δήπου παῖς ὢν ἐγὼ ταῦτ᾽ ἔπειθον αὐτοὺς ἀργύριον διδούς. ἀλλὰ μὴν ὁ πατὴρ αὐτὸς ζῶν ὀμόσας τὸν νόμιμον τοῖς φράτερσιν ὅρκον εἰσήγαγέν με, ἀστὸν ἐξ ἀστῆς ἐγγυητῆς αὑτῷ γεγενημένον εἰδώς, καὶ ταῦτα μεμαρτύρηται.
They are not just doing this because they were persuaded, but right away when I was a baby they introduced me to the phratry, to the shrine of our ancestral Apollo, and to the other sacred places. I certainly could not, when a boy, bribe them to do that! No, my father, while still alive, himself swore the customary oath when he introduced me to the phratry members, that he knew that I was an Athenian (astos) born of an Athenian woman (aste) betrothed to him, and this has been presented (transl. Bers 2003, 123-124).
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